Scandal Ratings: Olivia Pope Handles All-Time High

At least, it would seem that way with the ratings the season-three premiere of Scandal brought in. The ABC drama had 10.5 million viewers tune in to see how Olivia and Fitz (Tony Goldwyn) handled her name being leaked to the press. That's a series high, up 59 percent from the season-two premiere. Plus, the Scandal premiere generated more than 700,000 tweets. Way to go, Gladiators! Olivia and her flawless wardrobe/face/general existence would be so proud.

"The thing about season three is all of the sort of strands of the different characters' agendas and issues kind of come together…without so much pyrotechnics but in a much deeper kind of darker way, more rooted into our characters," Goldwyn said. "[Olivia]'s dad's a scary dude. So that all gets really weird."

Well, we love when things get weird on TV, so bring it on.

Michael Becker/FOX

While Scandal was up in the ratings, a lot of other shows dipped. Gleewas down 12 percent from last week's episode (4.5 million viewers) and The Big Bang Theory brought in 17.8 million, a 6 percent drop from their season premiere. The Vampire Diaries was up from the season-four finale with 2.2 million watching Elena (Nina Dobrev) enter college, but the CW drama saw a 19 percent decrease from the season-four premiere last fall.

Parks and Recreation held steady after last week's ratings (3.5 million), which means America is doing something right. Now if we can just get those numbers to tick up bit by bit, that'd be just spectacular.